I don’t know what we did to piss off the Movie Gods in 2013, because they were cruel. Boy, were they cruel. Almost every blockbuster that we got in ’13 was an eye-rolling disappointment. Not for lack of trying – Hollywood spewed out concepts that would make any cinephile...

Wow. Transformers: Age of Extinction is not bad. It is aggressively awful. With an opening statement like that, I know the Transformers apologists (who actually exist) will say, ‘oh, he hates the franchise’ or ‘it’s just a summer blockbuster’, but both of those excuses are...

Full Disclosure: I am one of the few people who didn’t enjoy the original 21 Jump Street. Sue me. Sure I was hungover as shit when I saw it, but that is normally a great reason to go and see a comedy. While the previous night’s festivities couldn’t have helped my surly response, my main...

Going to the cinema can sometimes feel like a gamble, but not if you bet on Tom Cruise. Love him or hate him, Tom Cruise makes good films. Full stop. The dude is an empire for a reason: with a few exceptions (please don’t make me watch Vanilla Sky again), his filmography ranges from...

X-Men: Days of Future Past is a really interesting film for a myriad of reasons. The most obvious is its brave attempt to reel the messy continuity of six films (including reboot/prequels and offshoots) into a single narrative. In sea of dumb franchise retreads, this is a risky and extremely...

I am a card-carrying member of the Marvel Comics fanboy club, yet I’m on the fence when it comes to Marvel Studios’ films. Don’t get me wrong, a unified Marvel cinematic universe is something that I dreamt about as a child, but now it is here, I’m lukewarm on the...

Straight off the bat, I have to disclose two things. First, I’m an atheist. It is not something that I wear with pride (I used to), but instead it is my position on the man in the sky. For me, it is the only logical conclusion. Second, I’m a massive Russell Crowe fanboy. I flat-out think...

Note: I saw Nymphomaniac in its four-hour form, not the 5.5 hour explicit cut.
I’d like to argue that I was always into strange and unique films, but if I’m being completely honest, my introduction to ‘Arthouse’ film was completely driven by my raging teenage libido. You see, back in...

I understand that some people like their cinema to be simple and enjoyable. I don’t. I love being challenged. I go out of my way to see films that attract controversy. Say, if a film is banned, my interest is piqued – I have to see it. As a result, I’ve seen countless horrific...

When is too much too much? This is the question Martin Scorsese asks in his scorching 23rd feature film The Wolf OF Wall Street. And what a way he asks. Scorsese – along with his current golden goose, Leonardo DiCaprio – assault the audience with an three hour orgy of unrepentant...

Director/writer/actor Spike Jonze is a hard cat to pin down. The last twelve months have seen him dangle saggy latex breasts in soup (in Jackass spin-off Bad Grandpa), play a dweeb who gives a job opportunity to Leonardo DiCaprio in a Martin Scorsese masterwork (The Wolf of Wall Street),...

Believe it or not, but Jack Ryan: Shadow Recruit is the fifth cinematic outing for Tom Clancy’s tenacious CIA analyst. This series has seen such talented thesps as Alec Baldwin, Harrison Ford and (ahem) Ben Affleck (I know, he has credibility now) take a stab at the titular role. The...